Editorial: The state of kids: Poor, and poorer

Updated 9:26 pm, Monday, October 8, 2012

As many as half the children in some New York cities are living in poverty.

THE STAKES:

Will the state merely treat the symptoms or try to solve the problem?

You can shrug off the fact that more than half the children in Schenectady and more than a third of the kids in Albany live in poverty as just another symptom of the Great Recession, one that will surely improve when the economy does.

That would be a mistake.

Poverty has a staying quality that can stretch across generations, something New York's leaders need to remember as they make decisions now about how they spend money, or don't. The decisions will bear not only on the poor, but on state government and taxpayers who foot the bills for health, food and other programs for the poor.

The latest poverty statistics reveal some of the worst numbers in decades. Nationally, poverty had been on the decline since 1959, when it stood at 22.4 percent nationally. It was down to 11.3 percent by 2000, but has been creeping up since, reaching around 15 percent the last two years.

The child poverty figures in some parts of the Capitol Region are even more alarming: 50.8 percent in Schenectady, 40.9 percent in Troy and 37 percent in Albany, according to the federal American Community Survey.

To be sure, the poverty rate nationally has reached these levels twice in the last half-century, in 1983 and 1993. This time, though, many economists speculate it will last longer because of a slow jobs recovery, unemployment benefits running out and possible cuts in programs like food stamps, Medicaid and welfare.

While there isn't one simple solution, one area in which state government could do more than just help people survive is to better educate them. Not surprisingly, unemployment is highest among people who never finished high school — 11.3 percent. It drops steadily the more education one has — to 8.7 percent for high school graduates, 6.5 percent for people with associate degrees, and 4.1 percent for those with a bachelor's degree or higher.

Getting a young person to stick out high school and go college requires, yes, a value on education at home, but it also takes quality schools and children who start school ready to learn. On those counts, New York has had a mixed record. While the state has required school districts to implement tougher teacher performance reviews to improve the work force and remove bad teachers, it has also imposed a 2 percent cap on local property tax levies and scaled back state aid. Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the Legislature also have yet to relieve schools of the costs of unfunded state mandates requirements in any significant way.

The state has also cut back on funding for one of the best anti-poverty programs — prekindergarten and kindergarten. Experts say these programs most benefit low-income children. But with funding down since 2008, schools are cutting back on early education programs even as the number of children in need of them grows.

And now Mr. Cuomo is signaling his intent to hold state budget growth to 2 percent or less next. But what does that mean for education — the best ticket out of poverty that kids have? He and lawmakers need to begin talking about that as the budget begins taking shape this fall.

Here's a test for the governor and lawmakers: When you boast next year about what a great budget you've passed, will you be as proud to tell it to a poor kid in Schenectady or Albany or Troy as to a group of Wall Street executives at a fundraiser in the Hamptons?